SANDY DISASTER RELIEF

Four days after Sandy made landfall in New Jersey, flooding large swaths of Hoboken and Jersey City, there are still 120,000 PSE&G customers without power in Hudson County, 18,000 in Hoboken alone, utility officials said today.

The flooding caused “severe damage” to Hoboken substations, officials said, adding that they can’t restore power to parts of the city that are still submerged.

“We cannot put a human life at risk,” said PSE&G President Ralph LaRossa today in a conference call with members of the media.

LaRossa said the utility has made “steady progress” increasing power to the region, though 690,000 customers statewide remain without electricity. PSE&G has 2.2 million customers in New Jersey.

During the conference call, PSEG officials did not give specific numbers of customers without power in Hudson County municipalities, other than Hoboken.

Hudson Now is working on getting those figures.

There are only two state highways left to be cleared of storm-related debris, so the utility is now concentrating on county and local roads and getting power restored to customers "along the way," he said.

Noting the gas panic that has erupted throughout New Jersey as many gas stations remain without power and others can’t get gas from refineries that have gone offline, Ralph Izzo, chair of Public Service Enterprise Group, said the utility restored power to a refinery and a pipeline that are both now “up and running.”

PSE&G officials would not estimate how many gas stations in the region are still without power. The utility is working with the New Jersey Gasoline Retailers Association to identify gas stations with supply but no power, Izzo said.

“We'll hopefully be able to work with the gas stations to have them up and running,” he said.

PSE&G opened a mobile unit in Hoboken at Washington Street and Observer Highway this morning to allow customers to charge electronic devices, and by 11 a.m. it was “already packed,” an official said.

The utility is still "moving in the direction" of getting power restored to parts of Bayonne tomorrow, LaRossa said.